The Creepiest Hotel
Hidden among Los Angeles' busy streets lies one of the world's most creepy and haunted buildings: the Cecil Hotel. Ever since it first opened its doors nearly one century ago, this hotel has been plagued with all sorts of odd, eerie events.
As scary as it sounds, at least 15 killings, suicides, or mysterious paranormal activities have been reported here, and the hotel's long list of guests include a few infamous serial killers. But when did all of this start?
Millionaire Investment
The Cecil Hotel was inaugurated in 1924 by a businessman named William Banks Hanner. Curiously enough, it was originally meant as a 4-star hotel for businessmen and social elites.
Hoping to attract some of the world's wealthiest families, Hanner invested $1 million to build a stunning marble lobby, an opulent staircase, and 700 rooms built in a Beaux Arts style. However, it wouldn't be long before he started regretting his investment...
Skid Row
Barely two years after the hotel's inauguration, the US was struck by the Great Depression. The economic recession had devastating effects worldwide, and Los Angeles was no exception.
Shortly after, the area adjacent to the Cecil Hotel became popularly known as "Skid Row", as its streets became home to hundreds of homeless unemployed people.
Sketchy Reputation
Therefore, the reputation of the once exclusive hotel was greatly undermined. Before they knew it, the building became a gathering spot for the homeless as well as for junkies and criminals.
To make matters worse, it wasn't long before the Cecil Hotel became embedded in popular culture as a symbol for violence and death. It all began in the early 1930s when some grisly events started taking place within its doors...
Multiple Suicides
Throughout the 1930s, at least six guests committed suicide during their stay in the hotel. They all killed themselves in different ways: some slashed their throats or shot themselves, while others jumped out of the window.
The first time that the Cecil Hotel made the news was when Sergeant Louis D. Broden slit his throat with a razor in the bathroom of his suite. Four years later, Marine Officer Roy Thompson jumped from the building's ceiling. As the decades went by, however, things started getting creepier...
Midnight Mystery
In September 1944, a teenage girl named Dorothy Jean Purcell was spending the night at the hotel when she suddenly woke up at midnight feeling gut-wrenching pains near her stomach.
Trying not to wake her partner up, she silently tiptoed her way to the bathroom, when she surprisingly gave birth to a baby boy. This was definitely a shocker as she didn't even know she was pregnant! But this isn't even the creepy part!
Killer Mom
After giving birth, Purcell was allegedly convinced that her baby was dead, so she threw the living newborn out the window. The baby landed on the roof of an adjacent building and was discovered the following morning.
To everyone's surprise, the woman was found not guilty of murder on the grounds of insanity. Because of this precise reason, she was sent to a psychiatric hospital, where she spent the next few years of her life. 15 years later, the Cecil Hotel came into the limelight once again.
Crushed By A Body
In 1962, a 65-year-old man named George Giannini was walking past the Cecil Hotel when, all of a sudden, a falling body crushed him to death. What are the chances?
It turns out that a 27-year-old woman named Pauline Otton had decided to take her life by jumping from the 9th floor. When both of their bodies were found, the police figured they had both committed suicide together since nobody had actually witnessed the tragedy. It wasn't long before the truth finally came to light...
Mystery Unveiled
When the police noticed that Giannini still had his shoes on, they realized it was highly doubtful he had jumped from the 9th-floor window, too. If he had, his shoes would've probably fallen off on the way.
Eventually, it was discovered that the woman had jumped from the window after having a heated argument with her husband. In the light of this series of unfortunate deaths, the hotel started being known as "the most haunted hotel in Los Angeles". The worst, however, was yet to come...
Infamous Guests
While the long series of suicides definitely played their part in the hotel's reputation, it's also worth mentioning that the building hosted some of the cruelest serial killers in American history.
In the mid 80s, for instance, Richard Ramirez — a serial killer found guilty of the murder of 13 people — spent several nights in a room on the hotel's top floor. To make matters worse, he was even staying there during the exact time in which he committed most of his murders.
In Cold Blood
Each time Ramirez killed one of his victims, he would throw his clothes soaked in blood inside the hotel's dumpster and walk through the main entrance wearing nothing but an underwear.
It comes as a shock that nobody ever suspected of the fact that he kept showing up at the lobby half naked. According to journalist Josh Dean, however, nobody even bothered "since the Cecil in the 1980s was total, unmitigated chaos". But when was he finally caught?
Finally Caught
As crazy as it sounds, Ramirez stayed in the hotel for several weeks without anyone ever raising an eyebrow. However, it was only a matter of time before the so-called "Night Stalker's killings came to light.
Sooner than later, many of the corpses started being found in alleys near the hotel, and this one time, a body was discovered lying on one of the building's hallways. However, the Night Stalker wasn't the only serial killer to choose the Cecil Hotel as a temporary home.
Another Serial Killer
A few decades later, in 1991, an Austrian serial killer named Jack Unterweger checked in the hotel. It's often believed that he chose this very same hotel precisely because of its connection to the Night Stalker.
Unlike Ramirez, Unterweger exclusively targeted prostitutes, often strangling them with their bra. Given that the Cecil Hotel was rather popular among prostitutes, the man would stalk them day in and day out before murdering them.
Unsresolved Crimes
It was only a matter of time before the Austrian psychopath was also found guilty of his crimes. However, it's also worth highlighting that not all of the cases of violence surrounding the Cecil Hotel were attributable to known serial killers.
In this sense, many murders that took place inside the building remain unsolved to this day. One of the most famous cases is that of Goldie Osgood, a woman found dead inside her hotel room in 1964. While a man was found soaked in blood just a few blocks away, he was soon found not guilty.
Black Dahlia
Another case that is often forgotten is that of Elizabeth Short, also known as the Black Dahlia, who was found mutilated a few yards from the Cecil Hotel back in 1947.
Prior to her death, Elizabeth had spent a few nights at the Cecil, but it's still unclear whether there was any connection between her murder and the hotel. The only clear fact is that she was found dead with her body cut in two near the hotel. These cases of violence, however, aren't only a thing from the past...
Death In The Water Tank
In 2013, the Cecil Hotel witnessed one of its most mysterious deaths ever. A Canadian university student named Elisa Lam was found dead inside the ceiling's water tank three weeks after going missing.
Suspicion began when several guests started complaining about the bad water pressure and the water's odd taste. When the plumbers opened the lid of the water tank, they found the young girl's naked body floating inside...
Controversial Footage
While the authorities determined that the student had died from drowning, nobody really fell for such a theory. Her case became a nationwide scandal once the footage of the surveillance cameras were made public.
Moments before her death, Lam can be seen shouting at someone in the elevator, except that there's nobody else in sight. She's then seen pressing all of the elevator buttons and waving her arms desperately as if she were trying to escape from some mysterious, invisible threat.
The Last Victim
Once the footage went viral, people seriously started suspecting that the Cecil Hotel was, indeed, haunted. These theories resurfaced once one last guest was found dead in 2015.
Even though his identity was kept secret, a 28-year-old man reportedly killed himself by jumping out the window. People were shocked by the fact that history had repeated itself, as this wasn't the first time that a guest killed himself this way.
Rebranding
In 2011, the hotel made an attempt to cast off its macabre reputation by changing its name to Stay On Main Hotel and Hostel and lowering its prices, hoping to reach out to tourists traveling on a budget.
A few years later, the owners renovated the building by including a boutique hotel, hoping to woo LA's social elite just like in the old days. However, no matter how much effort they put into it, the Cecil Hotel's reputation seems to be doomed for good...
No Way Back
While the owners hope that they will some day shake off the hotel's gruesome history by further renovations, Cecil will always be known as one of the world's most haunted buildings.
The hotel's spine-chilling history served as an inspiration to one of American Horror Story's latest seasons, which in turn helped shed light once again on the building's sketchy past.